Forrester survey discovers that virtually no one uses open source (?!?)
Posted by: admin in Business and PoliticsForrester just released a new survey, one that begs the question: Who paid for this rubbish?
I generally like Forrester’s work, but this survey flies in the face of each piece of research on open source that I’ve seen in the last five years…including research from Forrester. Also, as the research itself finds, often its survey respondents are using open source even when they don’t know it: Nearly half of those surveyed by Forrester who are using open-source frameworks (e.g., Spring) still claim they’re not using open source.
Forrester’s newest research finds:
- Seventy percent of decision-makers responded that they don’t have interest or have no plans to adopt open-source software;
- Only 23 percent of respondents stated expanding their use of open-source software was a priority;
- Security is the main concern around adopting open-source software. Eighty-eight percent of respondents stated it was an important or very important concern.
Incredible how open source’s greatest strengths are now being used against it. Security? I’m not suggesting that open source is perfect here, but it’s one of the primary reasons that people are dumping proprietary software for open source. This is a classic Microsoft spin, and directly contradicts Forrester’s own, earlier research that open source offers security advantages, not disadvantages.
Fortunately, if CIOs care to spend even a nanosecond checking Forrester’s claims about tepid adoption of open source, there’s a wide array of contradictory evidence, including from Forrester:
- Earlier this year, Gartner’s Mark Driver noted the following: “By 2012, 80 percent or more of all commercial software will include elements of open-source technology.”
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